Saltless In Seattle
Seattle refuses to use salt; roads “snow packed” by design
I guess someone forgot to tell them that the sound has saltwater… and this is what happens when the enviro-nazis take over.
The icy streets are the result of Seattle’s refusal to use salt, an effective ice-buster used by the state Department of Transportation and cities accustomed to dealing with heavy winter snows.
“If we were using salt, you’d see patches of bare road because salt is very effective,” Wiggins said. “We decided not to utilize salt because it’s not a healthy addition to Puget Sound.”
By ruling out salt and some of the chemicals routinely used by snowbound cities, Seattle has embraced a less-effective strategy for clearing roads, namely sand sprinkled on top of snowpack along major arterials, and a chemical de-icer that is effective when temperatures are below 32 degrees.
Seattle also equips its plows with rubber-edged blades. That minimizes the damage to roads and manhole covers, but it doesn’t scrape off the ice, Wiggins said.
That leaves many drivers, including Seattle police, pretty much on their own until nature does to the snow what the sand can’t – melt it.
Which leads to this… but they saved the sound from salt…
photo credit: sea turtle
December 23rd, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Maybe they could take a lesson from Calgary and use gravel; We don’t use salt or “chemical de-icer” up here.
December 23rd, 2008 at 2:54 pm
You do realize that they don’t use salt in most of western Canada right? It is why used cars from western Canada are better than used cars from eastern Canada.
December 23rd, 2008 at 3:09 pm
I saw a news report where they used the leftover whey after milking the cows (“curds and whey”) on the roads. It apparently works well. The journalist couldn’t refrain from making all sorts of bad puns.
December 25th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Down here in the SF Bay area we evaporate water from the bay in large ponds and create salt for use on roads. Has it occurred to the powers that be in Seattle that the rock salt they would be spreading is salt that came out of the Pacific Ocean to begin with?
http://www.cargill.com/sf_bay/about.htm
If they bought salt from Cargill, they would be returning Pacific Ocean salt, not adding any.
February 21st, 2009 at 7:59 am
[...] Best snarky blog post title goes to Secrets of Vancouver with their Saltless In Seattle post. (I hate you guys – that was genius). The best part is the very, very telling photos of the [...]